Life is a lazy river - no matter where you are. Movies, musicals, mysteries, pop culture, and lots of other great stuff.

Monday, April 10, 2017

Don't Look a Gift Card In the Kiosk

Emerged from my bed to a warm, sunny day, the warmest we've had since that freak heat wave in February. Celebrated with corn meal mush, Mineola oranges, and some Scooby Doo. The show's second incarnation after the original 1969 series was...well, kind of bizarre. The New Scooby Doo Movies had Mystery Inc interacting with animated versions of popular kid-friendly celebrities of the early 70's, like Sonny and Cher or Davy Jones. Some even had the kids encounter Batman or the Adams Family, or other Hanna Barbara characters. This was also the only Scooby Doo series to date to run for a full hour.

"The Ghastly Ghost Town" was, in fact, the series' first episode. The gang gets lost and find themselves in a ghost town amusement park/zoo run by the Three Stooges, here with Curly Joe. Someone's been sabotaging the park, to the point where the guys have had to close it. Mystery Inc helps them to get to the heart of the mystery...while figuring out how the robot gunslinger and cigar store Indian are able to move on their own.

Worked on writing for a few hours after breakfast. The Death Star has put quite a few holes in the Falcon, and they seem on the verge of taking them down...until The Crimson Hawk (Han) manages to shoot Vader's cannon. Shortly after, The Crimson Hawk's men, the Rogue Squadron, arrive with Jyn, Cassian, and Ashoka. Ashoka has hired Cassian as a reporter; Mon Mothma hired Jyn. Mon Mothma and Leia's aunt and uncle arrive by boat.

The Golden Eagle (Luke) hears Ben's voice, advising him to not use the target scope and just trust his instincts. He does...and the Death Star airship goes up in flames. Vader and many of his men survive; Tarkin does not.

Broke for lunch around 12:30. Continued the extra Scooby Doo episodes with one from the first series. "Mine Your Own Business" also concerns ghost towns...but there's no goofballs running around this truly abandoned burg. The kids dodge a ghostly miner while trying to figure out what he's really after in the abandoned mine tunnels.

Headed to work just as Scooby Doo was finishing. Probably thanks to the gorgeous weather, work was dead for most of the afternoon, and just barely steady during rush hour. That gave me plenty of time to finally organize the Gift Card Mall kiosk again. This time, I cleared out not only the credit gift cards, but also ones that we had huge stacks of, or ones that just weren't selling. I filled a cart with bags and boxes of cards we didn't need to the very top. Sorted through a new box. While this one did have more credit gift cards, it also had ones I could put out, including for Disney and XBox.

I'm very happy with the job I did...and so was the manager. He said keeping the Gift Card Mall in order can be my permanent job once a week now.

I did get out and gathered carts during most of the second half of my shift. It was absolutely gorgeous, 80 degrees and windy enough to keep it from feeling too warm. I just wish that manager hadn't called me inside 10 minutes before my shift ended again, this time to run an errand that another bagger ended up doing anyway.

Went straight home after work. Had leftovers for dinner while watching a few episodes of The Yogi Bear Show that involved birthdays. Ranger Smith tries a "Bearface Disguise," dressing as a polar bear to lure Yogi into stealing picnic baskets and being sent to the zoo. Yogi, as usual, is one step ahead of him. Snagglepuss is "Twice Shy" when he keeps encountering what he thinks is two Major Minors. The real Major wants him in a cage, but his twin brother Clyde just wants to take his picture. Yakky Doodle is in a "Happy Birthdaze" when he thinks he's buying a huge bone for his dog buddy Chopper, but it's really a massive dinosaur bone from the natural history museum.

Continued with Yogi while I cleaned up and started to boil the bones from the chicken to make stock. Yogi wants to wish Ranger Smith a "Slap Happy Birthday," but the ranger thinks he's up to no good. The joke is on Snagglepuss in "Cloak and Stagger." He wants to become a musketeer, but the real musketeers make him think that the king is a spy. Yakky Doodle finds himself "Horse Collared" when he helps an aging horse who thinks his owner wants to shoot him escape.

Finished out the night with Kirby's Epic Yarn. Space Land is the last regular world, and as such, is pretty difficult. You have to pull "live" wires so you can walk on them and lead hungry plugs to their sockets in order to make some lifts work. It was so complicated, I only got the first two rounds done. I'll see if I can finish this world later this week.